Leveling the Playing Field

John Um wanted to make sure small business owners could get fair pricing and access to reliable suppliers without needing to have significant buying power. As a leader whose career spanned several major retail and e-commerce companies, he had seen firsthand how hard...

Staying Fierce: Haley Gould Finds Perfect Fit in Vended Laundry

Haley Gould is the Director of Partner Success for HappyNest. She manages an internal team while leading more than 100 partners across the United States building a successful pickup and delivery operation in addition to running their laundromat business. A consummate...

Metrics That Matter

Profit, Performance, and Planning in Vended Laundry The laundromat business is like most businesses in that you need to do a lot of things right to be successful. But how do you know if it’s working? According to successful owners, you just need to look at the...

Startup to Scale

How Western State Design Has Been Helping Laundry Businesses Thrive for More Than 50 Years For more than five decades, Western State Design has been a leading provider of turnkey laundry solutions across the vended, on-premises, and commercial/industrial markets....

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What Does My Gas Bill Mean?

Jan 28, 2015

Originally posted - Jan 27, 2012 To understand how our utilities affect our bottom lines, we've got to understand our utility bills. Since I'm often asked to do analyses on energy savings, I've gotten a lot of practice at reading natural gas bills. In this article,...

So Many Reasons for Optimism

Jan 28, 2015

Originally posted - Jan 26, 2012 Despite all of the economic gloom and doom we've endured in recent years, I'm seeing some strong reasons for optimism in 2012, especially for coin laundry owners. And the best reason to be optimistic is because most of you reading this...

Can You Accept EBT Cards at Your Store?

Jan 28, 2015

Originally posted - Dec 28, 2012 The subject of EBT, or Electronic Benefit Transfer, acceptance has been a topic of discussion that is increasing in frequency among today's self-service laundry owners. The question of whether this new form of benefits payment can be...

Headlines

‘My Biggest Mistake’

Store Owners Share Some of Their Laundry Business Miscues "We should not look back unless it is to derive useful lessons from past errors, and for the purpose of profiting by dearly bought experience." – George Washington Even successful, long-time laundry owners make...

What’s Next?

An Interview with Author and Demographics Expert Paul Taylor Paul Taylor is the author of "The Next America: Boomers, Millennials and the Looming Generational Showdown." The book draws on his work at the Pew Research Center, a non-partisan "fact tank" that provides...

Finding a Winner

The Four Factors That Determine a Successful Coin Laundry Location [This article originally appeared in the December 2009 issue of The Journal of Coin Laundry and Drycleaning. This is the first in an ongoing, periodic series, in which we will resurrect some of the...

Tax Tips for Self-Service Laundry Owners

Smart Moves for Your Money in 2016 In my opinion, the best tax shelter that exists is a retirement plan. The most common retirement plans are IRA's (Individual Retirement Accounts), profit sharing plans, 401(k) plans, SEP (Simplified Employee Pension) plans, defined...

The Ozone Revolution

If You Haven't Thought About Adding Ozone Injection to Your Laundry Operation, Now Is the Time to Start Considering It I was in my office at my store recently when one of my attendants came in and told me there was someone there who wanted to speak with me. As it...

More Thoughts Off the Top of My Head

Observations on Life and the Laundry Business - The Sequel Just over a year ago, I wrote a column in this space, which was entitled, "Thoughts Off the Top of My Head."And it was so well-received that I felt a sequel was in order. As I noted in the original article,...

University of Arkansas Kicks Off ‘Wash Time Is Talk Time’

Free Books Provided During Event at Westwood Laundromat On December 4, Westwood Laundromat in Rogers, Ark., gave out free children's books to its customers, kicking off the northwest Arkansas "Wash Time is Talk Time"program. This initiative is part of the Laundry...

Loomis Bros. Names Sales and Marketing Manager

Missouri-Based Distributorship Promotes Matthew Lamons Loomis Brothers Equipment Co., based in Fenton, Mo., has named Matthew Lamons its new sales and marketing manager. In this position, Lamons will be responsible for growing the company's sales to self-service and...

WashClub Launches On-Demand Laundry Service in Bakersfield, Calif.

Brooklyn-Based Company Expands into Central Southern California Market WashClub recently launched its on-demand laundry service in Bakersfield, Calif. The city was chosen based on research indicating the community's growing population, which includes many...

Taylor Houseman Hosts Successful Event

Northern California Store Owners Turn Out for Education-Packed Profit Symposium Taylor Houseman Inc.'s recent Profit Symposium attracted approximately 40 northern California laundry owners and investors, according to company owner Randy Houseman. During the symposium,...

Speed Queen Sponsors Mudderella, Donates $30,000 to Support Futures Without Violence

‘Dirty for a Difference' Sweepstakes Winners Announced Speed Queen recently concluded its 2015 national sponsorship of Mudderella, an outdoor five- to seven-mile obstacle course event designed for women. Speed Queen joined forces with Mudderella to promote its "Dirty...

SBA Reopens Disaster Loan Filing Period for Those Impacted by Superstorm Sandy

The U.S. Small Business Administration has reopened the filing period for survivors in all states affected by Superstorm Sandy to apply for low-interest disaster loans. The new filing deadline for physical damage and economic injury losses is December 1, 2016. "The...

This Month's Issue

Green is Good Business: Green Operations Increasingly Important to Feed Consumer Demand
Women In Laundry: Lee Ann Geurts Loves a Challenge
Store Profile: Kings Laundry Kicking it in Los Angeles
Untapped Growth Opportunities
And More…

THE LATEST ON LAUNDROMATS

Industry News

Teeters to Host Open House

Teeters Products will hold its annual open house on November 14 at the company's headquarters in Fletcher, Ohio. This theme of this year's event is "Taking Your Laundromat to the Next Level"- with a focus on next level product performance, efficiency, engineering,...

Laundry Concepts Adds to Sales Team

Laundry Concepts has named David Gradle the newest member of the company's sales team. Prior to joining Laundry Concepts, Gradle spent 10 years working for an automatic door company, where he compiled bids utilizing architectural plans, met with prospects, presented...

Continental Promotes Kilgore to Director of Customer Experiences

Continental Girbau Inc. has promoted Laurie Kilgore to director of customer experiences. In this newly created position, Kilgore spearheads the development and evaluation of strategic, tactical and operational customer engagement plans, programs and initiatives....

Laundry One Hosts Open House, Adds New Branch Office

Nearly 100 laundry owners and managers attended Laundry One's inaugural open house and service school at the company's headquarters in Canal Winchester, Ohio. The event featured a presentation by Coin Laundry Association COO Michael Sokolowski, who discussed "Industry...

EnviroStar to Acquire Worldwide Laundry, Skyline Equipment

EnviroStar Inc. has executed definitive purchase agreements to acquire substantially all of the assets and certain liabilities of Worldwide Laundry Inc., Miami, and Skyline Equipment Inc., Houston, using a combination of cash and EVI stock. Worldwide is a distributor...